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I must admit that the best one is yours, followed closely by sq1vga one. The worst is absolutely sq5 one. No sane man would walk that way!

That said, I feel some sort of incoherence between how realistic the sprite is and how cartoon-ish the walk-cycle looks.

It reminds me a lot of this one:

http://youtu.be/e2pTt_7AjzM

It's a cool walk animation, but somehow unrealistic, so if you aimed at realism, you should make it less "dynamic" if you get what I mean.

Still sprites are very nice, really detailed and clean. Colours are slightly dull though, I'd use more contrast.

Animation isn't bad at all, even if I believe torso moves too much, and arms go too much on the back of the character. But it can be seen as a peculiar walking style more than a mistake, for sure.

Also... it kinda looks like you. 

I even dared to necrobump the thread for this purpose, and I'm sure he won't be disappointed since this could draw even more attention on his game.

"There is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about".

Oscar Wilde, The picture of Dorian Gray 

I don't want to demolish his work. He has the potential to do very interesting games in the future, and I hope my critiques will help him reach this goal. I even dared to necrobump the thread for this purpose, and I'm sure he won't be disappointed since this could draw even more attention on his game.

You're a genius. The Siamese twin concept is awesome, and so the way you implemented it (separate mouse-buttons for each twin, and pressing both to make them cooperate). The graphic is great, very professional and fit to the game-style. The plot is deeper than I could have imagined, and made me think (between a laugh and another ).

All aspects of the game are very balanced, I can't really point out a flaw. Even the ending screen and the soundtrack are very nice.

You have all my respect.

I'm playing and reviewing a lot of AGS games lately and yours caught my attention. To be honest, the whole Pc-gamer stuff, positive reviews and enthusiastic comments probably raised my expectations excessively, but I'm a bit disappointed. I don't regret the 10 minutes I spent on it, cause I had fun, but I don't know if I would have spent time to do such a game if I were you, unless this was some kind of preview of a future game or scripting exercise.

The plot is quite ordinary and both it and characters are not well portrayed... you could have gone deeper probably, by using a longer intro or some flashbacks.
Graphic is good enough for the purpose. Animations are good as well. Puzzles are very easy, and the only relevant thing is that floor-tiles part, which was unexpected. Thumbs up for the death at the end of the intro too, reminded me a lot of Liu Kang's fatality in MKII (or III?) and caught me by surprise. Intro "in medias res" are always a good choice and this one was well done, creating tension and hurriedness in the player.
Soundtrack is not that spot on though.

In conclusion: thank you for making this game, but I suggest you focus your energy and skill into something longer and more refined next time. I'd love to play another of your games if you keep the pros of Rein and correct its cons.

P.S. I'm no one and I didn't want to sound arrogant. Games I've made this far are absolutely awful compared to yours but I do believe that constructive criticism is 10 times better than pointless congratulations. I didn't mean any offence with my review.

Not your everyday game for sure, but I don't regret the 15 minutes spent on it. It's a really peculiar experience, pleasant and relaxing, and has a child-feel that somehow saddened me, since it's just a long lost memory now.
Carey's voice gives a special extra touch too.

Good luck with your future projects and your dream to be a game-designer.

And since we're compatriots: "in bocca al lupo!" 

First of all: really nice game, I liked the graphics, the faithful Sierra feel, and both intro and 3d-ish corridor are artistically and scriptfully remarkable. Humour could be more frequent and sometimes funnier, but it's more than enough to make the game very enjoyable. Story is too obscure though, and even if I like how the unexplained bits make my mind work and twist, this is not a wise choice as it gives the game some sort of amateur touch.

What I maybe liked most is the different approach to puzzles, and the wide spectrum of possibilities you took in consideration.

I've spotted this 2 issues though:

Puzzle-flaw:

Spoiler

As you reach the castle walls, you can go back and take the large rock even before you have tried the small one to break the window, thus making pointless the fact you couldn't take it immediately.

[close]

Bug:

Spoiler

In the treasure room, with the stone in my grasp, I thought I could fool Gary Gygax by leaving the disguise (made by wire, paper hat and cut tapestry, if you need to know) on the square carpet, but got this bug:

[close]

Oh, and damn... the max score I've been able to get is 43, having solved the dumbest version of the puzzle. Now I'll cheat all the time until I score 45 and then I'll try to solve the puzzle at the hardest difficulty setting.

My two cents worth on the story:

Spoiler

The Doctor knows too much about the stone, the castle, the wizard... I suppose he's the Duke, probably blood related to the mage, and one of those thieves who tried to stole from him. The wizard then created the barrier to prevent him to go back to the castle, and so the Duke has set up the perfect plan to obtain the item that will allow him inside the barrier: a stone that counteracts enchantments. But he needs Riel to get it from him, so he casts a spell to make her sister ill. I've got a fervid imagination, haven't I?

[close]

Wow, really charming game. Loved the atmosphere, and the concept. It reminds me of those DM-less roleplaying games, where what a player says he did may become part of the story (I'm talking about the dialogues, where your answers are always true, since there's not a game's reality but just a player's reality). Woah, you screwed up my brain with this game, I don't even understand what I'm saying.

I don't know if you chose purposely to use such a minimalistic graphic style, but I truly believe it was the best choice possible. In a game like yours, being able to apply your own characterization and personification on those stickmen adds a lot to the experience and atmosphere.

Ending kind of disappointed me though, and I hoped for more evident changes, in relation to my choices.

Still, a little gem.

I'm a Kubuntu user as well, version 10.10 right now. I found this tutorial so useful and this topic so interesting that I want to contribute with my experience as well.
If you're unsure if you're gonna try Vbox, don't be scared by the apparently long and complicated instructions Rickj wrote: if you take time to read them, you'll notice half of it is just to install Kubuntu, and the whole guide is written in the most precise and attentive way possible. If you have a linux system already installed and working, the whole process is very easy and just takes about 20 minutes + the time needed to install winxp and Ags (like you would on a physical PC).

First of all: the specs for the virtual machine suggested by RickJ worked perfectly fine for me with a physical machine older than Rickj's one (Intel E6300 1,87 Ghz, 2 GB RAM). My system shows about 700 MB of shared memory allocated (instead of the 640 expected), but just 45 MB of actual memory used, with ags running on a virtual winxp (sp3). Really not much, and I don't notice any slowdown in winxp nor kubuntu with normal use of both. Internet connection was set up automatically and worked fine.

GuestAdditions: the installation of GuestAdditions is very useful and recommended, but beware:

1. Clicking on the Virtualbox's taskbar -> Devices -> Install Guest Additions actually just mounts an .iso in the cd-rom drive. So you have to open My Computer after that, and double-click on the cd-rom drive to begin the installation. I don't mean to offend anyone with such a simple suggestion, and I'm sure most users would have figured this out by themselves, but even I honestly expected the installation to begin AS SOON AS I clicked on "Install Guest Additions".

2. The "mouse integration" feature (the one that captures mouse cursor as soon as you move on your virtualbox window) can cause some problems with your games. In my game, I have an interface which works this way: you right-click on something and then a GUI pops up and stays on screen until you click on something over that or move the cursor off of it. Unlike the MI3 verbcoin, you don't have to keep the mousebutton pressed all the time. Anyway, with the "mouse integration" enabled the interface didn't work as intended: the GUI stood on screen only as long as I kept the mousebutton down, and I couldn't move the cursor at the same time, so it was useless.
So, I guess  the mouse integration may cause other issues as well.
Luckily, you can enable and disable it in a matter of seconds. Just go on the VBox taskbar -> Machine -> Disable Mouse Integration and do the same to reactivate it. I suggest you keep it activated, as it's really useful, but in case you get strange responses from an application, try to deactivate it before you go mad searching for bugs in your code.

Seamless mode: as Rickj said, another really useful feature of Vbox is the Seamless Mode: you find this option in Machine -> Make Seamless.
Not only you can work fullscreen with it, but you only see the windows taskbar if no program is open in the virtual operating system. It's harder to explain than to use, but it really changes your experience with Vbox. See it for yourself. Mind that, when you're in seamless mode, the Vbox taskbar is hidden and only shows up if you hover the mouse on the central-bottom portion of the screen. And mind that some of the options listed in the submenus (Machine and Devices) are hidden as well, until you disable Seamless mode (right-ctrl + L , by default).

Shared folders: if you're not too familiar with Linux: don't be scared by what RickJ suggests about the shared folders: his approach is simply the most correct and reasonable one (creating separate groups and folders organized rationally). But the truth is, if you're lazy, you can simply create a folder inside your profile (/home/your_name/folder_name). Then you open Vbox, click on Settings -> Shared Folders -> Add Shared folder, and then select the folder you've previously created and click ok. On your virtual winxp then, you can go to My Computer -> Tools -> Map Network Drive and then select the drive letter you prefer and the folder you created. Make sure "reconnect on logon" is checked and click ok. Et voilà. You can now access that folder as usual, from My Computer.
A suggestion: call the shared folder with a short simple name: some characters aren't allowed and maybe a long folder name is unsupported as well. Just stay away from trouble, and call it "xpshared" or something like that.

Last, but not least: compared to opening them with wine (ver1.3) AGS games run a lot better: in fact, I can't see any difference when I run them on a real winxp installation. With wine instead, there are some games that run significantly slower and are almost unplayable (just some, the majority runs fine as well). Only issue, that's already been pointed out and I'm gonna confirm, is that Fullscreen mode doesn't work. I suggest you work fullscreen with Vbox and play/test ags games in windowed mode, maybe following Rickj's suggestion to use a filter to enlarge the window, if needed.

Thanks for pointing out the link was wrong. I've used the correct one now.

And thanks for your kind words. Btw, Duke's "stuff" is a 3 year long school, so there's no chance at all that he will work on the project like before. But he will help a little here and then.

Hey, AGSers, what's up?

Sorry for this short post after so many months, but I'm trying to spread the word in as many forums as possible and time is not on my side.

You can find important news regarding Forge here:

http://forge.freeiz.com/forum/index.php/topic,277.0.html

Please take the time to read, spread the word and try to help the project in any way you can.

Don't let Forge cool down. Forge must stay hot!

Thanks for reading,

Abisso

If you're asking me, I've never searched for, nor found any walk-through. I simply found a solution by myself.
But since I've finished the game shortly after that, I probably can help you too. So, please feel free to ask.

Looks like The Dig meets a very Blocky Another World. 8)

Actually, a "very blocky Another World" is a synonym to "Another World".

On a side note, I may enter this MAGS, cause I could use a small break from Forge. And I had an idea, but then I saw that breathtaking screenshot and I'm not so sure anymore. Btw, I've PMed you mode7.

[EDIT:]

EDIT: I've been too easily discouraged at first, but now I've found a solution myself. Sorry for having dug out this auld thread.

*his mind goes to that time he had to manually rename 60.000 files miraculously recovered from his broken hard disk*

60,000?!??! dear god man! I would have given up after 1000 files.

Well, not exactly 60.000, to be honest. Some of them were automatically restored with their extension too, thanks to a life-saving application. But surely more than 10.000. The event stole my will to create AGS games too (since I was been able to recover game development files just partly), and still, 5 years after the accident, I haven't created anything else.

Back on topic though: my netbook's motherboard battery doesn't work anymore, and at the start, I'm asked to load BIOS default options to go on, which is a bit annoying. Expired batteries are a common event with PCs, and it takes just 5$ + 5 minutes to change it. But in this case, I'd have to open the netbook completely to reach the battery and this is both dangerous for its integrity and time-taking. Question is: other than having to press F2 every time I turn the netbook on, and having a wrong time and date, what are possible extra problems a dead CMOS battery can give?

Hello!
I am thinking in buying a 500GB External Hard Drive.
I have two options, Hitachi and Samsung. I know Samsung is a well known brand in TV and other stuff, are their HD good to? Hitachi is a lot cheaper. 
Are there any computer geeks with an opinion on this subject?

I've had bad experiences with Maxtor which now's been acquired by Seagate, and good experience with Hitachi. I'm neutral towards WD since I've only used my external WD hard disk just a few times, and I've never known Samsung sold hard disks too.

My suggestion is to buy two cheap ones, and regularly mirror them. The only safety is in duplication.

*his mind goes to that time he had to manually rename 60.000 files miraculously recovered from his broken hard disk*

I'd say Chapter one is about 20-25% ready, but unfortunately I will have very few moments to script further until February. University, Krishn-mas and personal problems aren't helping me, sadly.

But do not worry, fans, sooner or later we'll make it.

Otherwise it looks quite good and I hope you can stick with it until it's complete!

Don't just "hope"... BE PART OF IT! 


P.S. I'm a huge fan of your art. Respect.

Easy - Shows line, High tolerance
Standard - Shows line, Lower Tolerance
Expert - Does not show lines, Lowest Tolerance

Things are exactly the way you described them, except for the fact Easy is called Practice. In the tech demo you played, I mean. Try it again and you'll see for yourself.

By the way, keyboard support (using arrows instead of mouse) has been implemented already. This will make things as easy as they can be.